Literary Essays
Nicknames
Our first morning viewing Rockaway apartments was rough. The commute on the train had been brutal, and my nerves were frayed. One place smelled of cat urine. Another was too far from public transportation. Our realtor, as disenchanted with us as we were with her, dropped us off at a restaurant and wished us luck.
The bartender introduced himself as Jimmy and asked why we’d come to the Rockaways in winter. After we told him, he yelled to the kitchen, “Conrad, there’s a couple of baby butterflies out here I want you to meet!”
Baby butterflies? Were we about to be hazed?
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Read the whole piece in The Sun
This Is Not A Nature Essay
Another writing conference, this one is full of environmental writers. The teacher is kind, earnest. We are supposed to contemplate an object, working our writerly muscles towards lyric essays. We are instructed to choose the first object that comes to mind. The teacher leads us through a series of prompts to elucidate our awe and wonder, pausing halfway through to hear what object each student picked. I have written with abandon, barely breathing as I transcribe what feels so clear when I listen. It is only when these lovely, generous writers begin naming dewy, lush natural images that the dissonance becomes clear to me. Mossy birdbath. Shy frog under a lettuce leaf. Blossoming radish.
Um. I wrote about how my toaster might be a libertarian hedge fund bro.
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Read the whole essay in the literary philosophy journal, Book XI
Chocolate and Pearl
During the 2020 Australian bushfires, I housesat for a fellow anti-nuclear activist in Melbourne. The most important piece of my duties was caring for two chickens, Chocolate and Pearl, who changed the way I thought about relationships with animals and food. Before my time with these two big personalities, I had seriously under-estimated the temperaments and traits of chickens.
Caring for Chocolate and Pearl made my decision to eat chicken a choice that I can never make without thinking about their lives as lives.
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Read the whole essay in The Peace Chronicle (illustrated with original paintings by Cathleen Halloran)
Decolonize This Quarantine
At the risk of making a teachable moment out of this pandemic, I’m wondering how we to decolonize our approach to it. Whose body is most at risk and whose is most protected? What kinds of historical situations have created vulnerabilities in communities? How has this virus and our fear of it changed our relationships with land, air, water, animals and plants? How do we live through this moment without using our own fears and vulnerabilities as a pretext for harming others? Can we accept questions as an authentic response to this time rather than demanding simplistic, trite aphorisms?
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Read the whole essay in The Peace Chronicle
Plays
Delphi Falls
Girls just wanna have cults. When high school senior, Mara, decides to start a cult rather than apply for college, her girlfriend Savannah struggles to articulate what she wants and how to escape her small town life. Delphi Falls is a reminder of how it feels to be in love for the first time and why we should never, ever underestimate the power of teenage girls.
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Production: 2023 Meganne George Women's Work Short Play Festival, New Perspectives Theatre Company
What Do You Say at the End of the World?
Everyone's waiting for the world to end at any moment.
Larissa and Ian haven't seen each other since they broke up.
Can they figure out what to say to each other before it's all over?
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Production: Emerging Artists Theatre’s New Work Series, TADA Theater, October 13, 2018, directed by Neal Kowalsky
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Production: Secret Theatre, Long Island City, July 14, 20, 25, 29, August 2, 4, 2018 Directed by Neal Kowalsky
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Recognized as a Finalist for Best One Act Play; Won Best Actress – Secret Theatre; August 2018
Appalachian Trail
In the course of 24 hours of hiking on the Appalachian Trail, two couples struggle to navigate the past and the future of their relationships. Married couple Syd and Sam are hiking the entire AT in the wake of Syd’s health crisis. Dating couple Leah and Alex might be on the brink of engagement as they hike towards the campsite for the night. Whit is a feral, fierce eleven year old girl who inhabits the forest and shapes the lives of all four hikers with her competence and commitment to the green world of the wilderness. A reminder of why we should ALWAYS sweat the small stuff!
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Finalist for Wordsmyth Theater Company, 2021
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Semi-finalist for Garry Marshall Theatre, 2022
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Semi-finalist Panndora Productions New Works Festival, 2022
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Bechdel finalist, Fall 2022
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Two full public readings with actors as part of Second Draft workshop, ESPA, Spring 2019
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Developmental workshop - Fail Better Collective, August 5, 2018
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Selected scenes, reading, Kenyon Playwrights Conference, Summer 2018
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Reading - Chelsea Rep LAB, June 9, 2018; Directed by Robert Siveris
Luminescence
Three people on a Buddhist retreat are trapped together after the wall of a cave collapses and have to figure out how to sustain themselves and each other in the dark. Luminescence is about being present to each other in whatever ways we know how, fixing what we can, caring for the people around us and being brave in the face of everything else.
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Semi-finalist, Premier Stages, 2023
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Reading with Playground Experiment, 2023
Tiny Blurs of Light
Five scappy activists win the ultimate prize. But what do we lose when we win?
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Bechdel finalist, Fall 2021
The Interstitial
Jerome and Rosie are both dead. But being in the world has never felt more alive. The Interstitial is a tiny meditation on being a good ancestor and how we hang on to what is most alive.
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Published by Choeofpleirn Press, September 2021, Rushing Through the Dark issue
